Having conquered the e-reader market with the Kindle, Amazon is now about to unveil a tablet to rival Apple’s iPad. The e-commerce giant has placed an order with Taiwan-based company Quanta Computer for 800,000 touch-screen tablet devices, which could be ready as soon as the second half of the year.
Qanta already manufactures BlackBerry’s Playbook tablet and is expected to produce a similar device for Sony. But Amazon’s new tablet, which is believed will use Google’s Android operating system, has the best chance of taking on the iPad. Like Apple, Amazon has its own app store which will allow scope for extra revenue that many rivals for the iPad do not have.
Amazon currently has a solid standing in the film and music downloads market, and so are in great shape to release a tablet which can utilise this type of media. “The combination of a strong brand and loyal customers with content they could sell would make it an attractive prospect. The Amazon Music Store and books would be compelling and unique,” Adam Leach, an analyst at Ovum, told media.
E-books are more popular than ever, with sales rising by 20 per cent to £180million last year, according to the Publishers Association. The relentless march of the e-book has been led by the iPad and the Kindle. Amazon’s e-reader is currently the most popular device of its kind on its site both in the UK and the U.S. Figures released last month showed that e-books have become the single best-selling category in American publishing for the first time.
The report from the Association of American Publishers said that e-book sales in February were $90.3million, making digital book the largest single format in the U.S. for the first time. However, analysts believe the e-reader has peaked and a steady decline in sales will now start. It is estimated that by the end of next year, more people will own tablets than e-readers, and that by 2015 twice as many people will own tablets than e-readers.
This is largely due to the limited functionality of an e-reader when compared to a tablet computer that offers e-reader apps and a seemingly unlimited supply of innovative apps. The tablet market is expected to be worth over £20billion by the end of next year, according to JP Morgan.
